Deal view: Ashurst strives to reboot M&A brand but deal market is getting tougher

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Deal view: Ashurst strives to reboot M&A brand but deal market is getting tougher

Ashurst’s once-admired M&A reputation has taken a pounding of late. One former partner delivers representative sentiments: ‘Corporate was the jewel in the crown. The firm has changed from what it was six or seven years ago.’ Another notes: ‘It used to be joint number one with Clifford Chance for private equity. The practice faded away as it focused outside London.’

A controversial Australia merger, a soft run of financial performance and the loss in recent years of prominent partners has taken a major toll on its brand as a serious plc deal adviser. Continue reading “Deal view: Ashurst strives to reboot M&A brand but deal market is getting tougher”

The last word: Speaking out

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The last word: Speaking out

With the recent Weinstein revelations shining a light on sexual harassment and misogyny across every industry, we ask senior lawyers for their views

Call it out

‘Sexual harassment of anybody in any circumstance is outrageous. It must be called out at every opportunity and condemned for what it is – an insidious abuse of power.’

David Morley, member, Mayor of London’s International Business Advisory Council Continue reading “The last word: Speaking out”

Sponsored briefing: Adoption of predictive coding for legal document review

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Sponsored briefing: Adoption of predictive coding for legal document review

Navigant’s Tanya Gross asks how close are we to mainstream acceptance?

Predictive coding helps tackle large document review exercises. It enables the reviewer to find key documents by training the technology to identify documents of interest (through an algorithm and selected criteria) rather than relying solely on manual human review decisions, which are often subjective. This reduces the time and legal cost associated with review exercises and gets the most relevant documents into the hands of senior counsel quickly. Continue reading “Sponsored briefing: Adoption of predictive coding for legal document review”

Bangs and whimpers – LB100 performance is a lot weaker than it looks

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Bangs and whimpers – LB100 performance is a lot weaker than it looks

In the wake of the banking crisis, some commentators claimed the legal industry was set for a bloodbath that would sweep away 10,000 solicitors’ jobs from a flabby trade. As so often, the profession defied the critics, handling its post-Lehman reboot with assurance. Now, after posting on the face of it impressive numbers for 2016/17 in the shadow of Brexit and two major electoral upsets, there is talk of the resilience of the industry. The Legal Business 100 (LB100) has, after all, grown from £12.25bn to £22.06bn over the last decade and this year the group at long last surpassed its record PEP of £703,000 set way back in 2008.

And yet scratch the surface and there is much cause for unease. A good chunk of the long-term growth of the UK’s largest firms is due to consolidation, while the 2016/17 results have been hugely flattered by currency movements. Taken as one year, the numbers are respectable, but the long-term view is ominous, particularly for the City’s traditional leaders. Continue reading “Bangs and whimpers – LB100 performance is a lot weaker than it looks”

What ails Freshfields? Time is running out for ‘The Last Champions’

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What ails Freshfields? Time is running out for ‘The Last Champions’

The headline of the last lengthy piece Legal Business carried on Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer said it all: The Last Champions. While there is no doubt that the Magic Circle has faced huge challenges asserting itself since the banking crisis, for many Freshfields was the member of the club with the best prospect of securing its place in the global elite.

But the City giant will be faring much worse on the profession’s saloon bar test if it keeps generating headlines like this summer, notably the news in July that co-managing partner Chris Pugh was stepping down less than halfway through his term. This surprise announcement came in the same month as financial results showed Freshfields being comprehensively outclassed by its City peers. Freshfields’ revenues have grown by just 17% in five years and the firm has been a fitful performer for nearly a decade now. While the metrics look better in profitability and revenue-per-lawyer terms, Freshfields has certainly not outpaced London rivals even on its core targets. Continue reading “What ails Freshfields? Time is running out for ‘The Last Champions’”

Associate pay smoke screen: it’s fooling no-one

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Associate pay smoke screen: it’s fooling no-one

Associate pay used to be simple. Lockstepped and transparent to the nth degree on both sides of the Atlantic, you knew exactly where you stood and exactly when the legal market was overheating.

There were obvious downsides to such transparency. Back in the late 1990s/2000s boom, a salary war triggered by Palo Alto law firms within weeks translated into huge hikes in New York. Soon enough London followed when SJ Berwin announced 25% pay hikes that spread through the market like wildfire. This was the first age of the online message boards, which further stoked the inflationary pay cycle. Continue reading “Associate pay smoke screen: it’s fooling no-one”

The last word: A period of drama

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The last word: A period of drama

From living with Brexit to harnessing technology, Legal Business 100 leaders state what must be done to thrive

HARD CHOICES NECESSARY

‘We’ve been building on our strengths and worrying less about the things we don’t do but other firms do. We’ve been forced to make choices that we didn’t have to ten years ago because it isn’t viable anymore to do everything or pretend to do everything. Not even the Magic Circle can do that. It is about identifying where you want to play and focusing on that.’

Jeremy Hoyland, managing partner, Simmons & Simmons Continue reading “The last word: A period of drama”

Sponsored briefing: Disputes flare up in the oil and gas sector

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Sponsored briefing: Disputes flare up in the oil and gas sector

Navigant’s Mark Taylor on the pressures that oil prices exert on contracts in the sector

We all know how the price of fuel at the pump can affect how individuals feel about their own prosperity. For producers in the oil and gas sector, oil price uncertainty is a substantial risk, since it has a direct bearing on a project’s return on investment. Assumptions about future oil prices always weigh heavily on investment decisions, but in recent years severely fluctuating prices have added economic risks for producers, on top of the inherently complex engineering challenges of exploration and production. Continue reading “Sponsored briefing: Disputes flare up in the oil and gas sector”

Magic Circle playbooks in Europe are full of contradictions

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Magic Circle playbooks in Europe are full of contradictions

To recap as the UK tiptoes towards banana republic territory in the wake of last month’s inconclusive, prediction-defying general election: City professionals face the prospect of an unsteady government negotiating a logistically-epic exit from the EU with an uncertain agenda against a much larger and better prepared counter-party. That is until the next general election in perhaps the autumn.

But let us put politics to one side and assume that a form of substantive Brexit is happening. Where does that leave top London law firms with such ominous clouds hanging over London as a finance and legal services hub?

Continue reading “Magic Circle playbooks in Europe are full of contradictions”

Answer to law firms’ social ills is not another league table

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Answer to law firms’ social ills is not another league table

Have we reached peak aspirational employer league table yet? From the perspective of the legal industry we certainly should have, given the trend in recent years for the profession to turn up with improbably high rankings in a proliferating range of ‘best employers for…’ tables.

Were an alien to descend to earth and judge the industry on the basis of these rankings they would conclude that the profession had cracked social mobility, gender diversity, gay-empowerment and quality of life… all the while generating a tonne of money.

Continue reading “Answer to law firms’ social ills is not another league table”